So, any of you a Domination player? Almost every game I go and win I'll usually go either the score route and win by votes by building the UN or by winning a culture victory. I've been wanting to be a super aggressive dick and just cackle like a madman as i burn cities down with my massive army. I had one game where I played as Japan and did just that and all was going well until all the other civs finally realized i was a major dick and decided to team up against me. Needless to say I lost my capital and things just went downhill from there. 800+ turn game lost.

So, whats the best way to take other civs out without drawing the ire of damn near everyone. Any suggestions on what civ to play as to attempt this? I'm not super good at the game so I've been playing on Prince difficulty. I'd like to score a domination victory. Cheers if anyone has tips. (Edit: Also shit... didn't realize i posted in the Gods & Kings board I've only got vanilla civ)

I usually try to roll with a culture victory, but once I did try to win the space race which was really fun! I will say there was one game where I had developed a substantial army and had artillery and planes and all the fancy weapons(and my opponents still had musket-men), along with a massive collection of these units... I still ended up going through with culture... Something about trying to wipe out the other folks just doesn't feel right. But, it's something to try for sure! I will say I tried the UN victory just once, I will never again because I couldn't get one friggin' guy to vote for me, no matter what I did for him. That kinda ruined the UN thing for me, but hey, I might give it another shot soon...

I will say, a few games I've had people ask me to help them go to war, and I've taken a couple of cities from the enemies. It seems like if you do it earlier on, the nations have become established enough to really know what's going on and thereby get too angry. That way, early on you'll have some substantial control, just remember to annex a few cities only once you've gotten the courthouse, and either raze or puppet the rest (personal play-style opinion). Oh, and definitely try to move as quickly as possible through militaristic techs (it doesn't hurt to have muskets when folks are still running around with longbows and swords). Research into catapults and the like as early as possible and try to maximize production/science (I would say in that order, but that's just me).

As for civ type, it really depends on the type of map you're rolling with. I mean if you're doing pangea I would say America, Germany, or Japan. Really, any of the industrial military-based civs. If you're doing the World map or archipeligo, I would say definitely kick it with the English, or with Denmark. Although, with the World map, it really depends on where you land on the map... Try different civs with different map lay-outs and see which one, militaristicly suits your play-style!

Hope that helps! (I'm not terribly good at this game either, so... yeah)

Well, I usually focus on science and tech, and try to burn as few cities as possible (even if building a courthouse is a bitch). But I'm used to the lower difficulties, so I can't offer concrete advise for higher end stuff.

Ya I have been trying to get a domination victory lately too. What I found helps is to look at who is friends with who. Look for any Civs that haven't declared friendships with anyone and take them out first. Also if an opposing Civ takes control of a whole continent its probably best if you try to knock them down a peg.

And make sure you make lots of science, don't want to be left behind.

My brother has won domination victories on all difficulties except the highest (he's still working on that one). In fact, he set victory conditions so that he could do nothing BUT domination victories.

On the higher difficulties, the trick is essentially luck, as well as exploiting the A.I's terrible combat tactics (the computer can't fight to save its life - it wins on the higher difficulties solely by cheating). My brother would start the game again and again until he was set up somewhere decent with enough distance between the other Civs. He would then play the game SUPER cautiously and take terrain into account and all that sort of stuff. It was difficult. At times he was at war with everyone but still managed to win. Also, if you train your units the right way (giving them the medic ability, etc), then you can, at least on King difficulty, set up defenses with ranged units that the computer can't kill - for example, artillery on a hill next to a lake - the computer will pointlessly try to charge over the river, get hammered, retreat and then do it all over again, earning XP for your unit. Little tricks like that.

On Vanilla Civ, it's impossible to stop the AI from ganging up on you once they realize what you're up to. You can try to ally with other Civs temporarily against one opponent, but that often doesn't work the first time.

It's difficult to win domination victories on difficulties higher than King. My brother has failed more times than he's succeeded - the computer DOES cheat after all, on any difficulty above Prince. I'd say play on the lower difficulties (prince, etc) to learn the "tactics" the A.I uses - because the tactics don't change - an A.I on Emperor difficulty is just as brain-dead and stupid as one on Prince Difficulty, but it cheats a lot more and can get units for virtually free.

So I tend to go for a culture victory, but my last two games I went for Domination as the Mongols and the Chinese. I think the only reason I won is because I made as many cities as I could early on no matter what, and just never stopped producing units. I'd pretend I can help you, but the hardest difficulty setting I've ever played on is Warlord.

Alright, I have a question about this.

I found playing on warlord and going for a diplomatic victory to be easy, I steam rolled everyone in tech, culture, diplomatic and while I didn't have the best military, I still managed to take two cities off the civ that did pretty easily.

However, I'm finding that playing on warlord going for a domination victory on a large map to be harder. I managed to take out 3 out of 9 capitals so far (around the modern era) but I'm having a few issues.

1. Everyone declares war with me at once.
2. I only have one friend meaning hardly any research agreements.
3. I somehow fell behind in tech behind Rome and India so they have better militaries even though I've been pumping out units and researching military tech.
4. I can't go and attack weak city capitals because they are behind enemy cities and I can't get open borders, and destroying 10 cities just to get to one is annoying.

Thanks,

(can't edit on the mobile site) I should also mention that I'm not in a terrible place since I have the third best military but I'm still a bit worried due to other civs getting culture victories etc because of the above reasons I mentioned. I was actually doing pretty good until suddenly.

I've tried getting other victories besides total military domination, but I don't have the attention span to do so.

So I build massive armies then crush my enemies. It's good.

Yep, I mostly go with an domination victory. I'm not good at cultural or science victories, Domination is the easiest to get and the most fun.

I mostly win by domination in all games due to the length of time it takes to get a science, culture or economic/UN victory. My average win time is about 300 turns (usually 4-5 hours) and I usually play on immortal. I have won a few deity games but they are really dependent on how good your starting resources are and how close you are to an aggressive AI.

The key to winning with war is to exploit your chosen Civ's unique ability or unique unit. I just played an island map game with the Dutch and was rolling all over the map with the unique "Sea Begger" ship, plus some support frigates to bombard land units, and had taken every capital by turn 220 (was playing on King because I'm still getting used on how to choose my religious setup). I have done the same with the Chinese Cho ko Nu and Siam's elephants in vanilla. Tech as fast as possible to these techs and produce some units while getting there that you can upgrade with cash.

To stop everybody hating you make sure not to declare war on a friend and denounce someone before going to war with them. There will come a point where everybody will hate you. But by then you should have a big enough lead that you could crush them.

@J_Las_Vegas: I've never played at the difficulty levels you're describing, but yes, pretty much exactly this on the lower levels will definitely net you a domination victory. Having a civ with strong early units (Alexander, the Celts, etc.) can really help wipe out most civs before they become a problem, leaving you to simply mop up the rest at your own rate.

You can also bribe the hell out of neutral civs to declare war against another, which doesn't guarantee you a peaceful co-existence, necessarily, but it can work wonders in tearing apart frequent allegiances. It's a nice monkey wrench to throw into things if you have the extra luxury resources to spare.

Come to think of it, I don't think I've actually won a domination victory - just the "highest score" win while wiping out a good chunk of the world. If you're after the cheap Steam achievements, I think you could probably get a couple by using the tiny map setting, having only one other civ, and possibly using the one-city challenge option. I don't know if that applies to other civs or not, but if you play as Alexander, you should breeze through the fight.

Often times my science/tech games just turn into domination games. I'll just be cruising along with my science and then some Civ does something that pisses me off and I'll start destroying. I'm so far ahead of everybody with my tech that my army can stomp theirs easily.

I just haven't fully grasped culture yet. I understand you want to keep small civilizations to keep policy costs low, but because of that my scores end up being really low because of that. Are you just sacrificing good scores if you want culture or am I missing something? Also with the latest patch and expansion culture has been nerfed in my opinion. Stonehenge used to give you 8 culture but now it's 5 faith.

All i know is, the AI in Gods and Kings is a lot more aggressive on normal. I'm gonna try to have good relations with most civs and then attack the one they attack.

Basically the best way to play against the AI is to team up and try to goad them into hating another civ before attacking it (bonus if you can get them to co-operatively declare war). I feel like by going the total dick route, you're inevitably *going* to draw the ire of most other civs (they always seem to make that switch from "okay with you" to "warmongering menace" after awhile). You'll probably be okay with other aggressive nations as long as you team with them, but I'd always be working to undermine them as well just to make sure they don't become more powerful than you in the process of conquering.

This is why I often team with the City-States when going this route (unless I'm playing Genghis Khan, of course). That way you also have the fallback option of UN vote victory, though I find that a science victory is almost always easier to achieve (at least, on Prince or King).

For some reason, all I can ever seem to achieve is the science ending with winning the space race. I tried to go for the diplomatic victory once, but it turned into a seesaw financial battle with another Civ that kept buying the last city-state needed to achieve the victory. I got frustrated and kept building my space ship.

@TheDudeOfGaming said:

All i know is, the AI in Gods and Kings is a lot more aggressive on normal. I'm gonna try to have good relations with most civs and then attack the one they attack.

The AI has gotten smarter. My neighbor declared war on me and I was attacked from multiple positions rather than the seemingly endless suicide runs where they all fall into one path like before. I still repelled the attack handily, but it was encouraging to see the AI change things up on me.

@QuistisTrepe: I've noticed too that unallied AI civs will take advantage of any unguarded borders. It should be a pain and I should be cussing them out for it, but in all honesty, it makes the game so much more tense and fun.

I typically clear out the continent I'm on and keep it for myself. After I build an advanced and massive navy I invade the other civs and they are usually fighting each other when I invade so everything just comes easy.

i dont think combat works well in the game at all its way to random and the pc units seem to spawn in thin air i cant tell you how many times i have attacked another country and they easily will go from 0 units to a couple dozen in like 2 turns lol and when you do get to the combat part your damge seems to be random i have had plain warriors beet musket men with my musket men doing 1 dmg

Like many people here, my default is cultural (almost always the fastest except on very small maps) but I do military victories sometimes. Usually I do a really early war against the closest person I meet, especially if my civ has an early unique unit (like the mayans). I find people tend to forget after a couple thousand years.

I kinda try to play each civ in its 'ideal' manner. So I went for a military victory as the Celts, science with the Mayans, culture for Ethiopia...etc. I generally prefer peaceful builds, just because I am a really hard builder in 4X type games. "Well sure, I am at war and I COULD build military units. but this city doesn't have a library yet...". I can never play on too high difficulties cause I alwlys build every building in every city, it tends to be cost inefficient. I just can't help myself though.

I wish I can be that kind

@NekuSakuraba said:

Alright, I have a question about this. I found playing on warlord and going for a diplomatic victory to be easy, I steam rolled everyone in tech, culture, diplomatic and while I didn't have the best military, I still managed to take two cities off the civ that did pretty easily. However, I'm finding that playing on warlord going for a domination victory on a large map to be harder. I managed to take out 3 out of 9 capitals so far (around the modern era) but I'm having a few issues. 1. Everyone declares war with me at once. 2. I only have one friend meaning hardly any research agreements. 3. I somehow fell behind in tech behind Rome and India so they have better militaries even though I've been pumping out units and researching military tech. 4. I can't go and attack weak city capitals because they are behind enemy cities and I can't get open borders, and destroying 10 cities just to get to one is annoying. Thanks,

@NekuSakuraba said:

(can't edit on the mobile site) I should also mention that I'm not in a terrible place since I have the third best military but I'm still a bit worried due to other civs getting culture victories etc because of the above reasons I mentioned. I was actually doing pretty good until suddenly.

Anyone? Or is this just a lost cause and I should start a new game?

@NekuSakuraba: I'm in kind of a similar situation, except my two neighbouring Civs have been dicks the entire game. One kept trying to invade me despite having a terrible military and knowing it (he's pretty much out of the game now as a result) but the other is actually in the lead and has the most powerful military and seemingly most advanced tech. He's lining my borders with his troops and just unlocked nukes. I always try to take over another continent to myself so that I have a backup plan (I'm playing on the world map and took Australia).

TL;DR I'm fucked, but have a backup landmass. Maybe try that route?

@GS_Dan said:

@NekuSakuraba: I'm in kind of a similar situation, except my two neighbouring Civs have been dicks the entire game. One kept trying to invade me despite having a terrible military and knowing it (he's pretty much out of the game now as a result) but the other is actually in the lead and has the most powerful military and seemingly most advanced tech. He's lining my borders with his troops and just unlocked nukes. I always try to take over another continent to myself so that I have a backup plan (I'm playing on the world map and took Australia).

TL;DR I'm fucked, but have a backup landmass. Maybe try that route?

Only once have I had other civs get nukes, and they used them that one time. Luckily I also had nukes and ultimately took care of that problem. Is it a foregone conclusion that the AI will use nukes once they have them? I don't trust the AI even when they only have sticks and stones as I find them aggressive and mostly schizophrenic.

@druid42: Probably. They seem to attack for no reason anyway.